TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands October Flights from SJU to EIS

Sooooo we booked our flights in March for our 10 day sail starting October 30th (Happy Birthday to me!). We've booked United that gets us into San Juan at 12:22 PM on Tuesday October 29th and initially Seaborne Airlines NOW Silver Airways operated by American... that leaves San Juan at 1:50 PM. (It was leaving at 2:20 but now they've moved them up) I know we were supposed to book a through fare to eliminate any issues but it didn't happen that way.

Question is do we have enough time as it stands now (1:28 of course hoping there's no delays along the way...) to arrive in San Juan, get our bags and check in to the Seaborne-Silver-American flight to Tortola?

It's been 5 years since our last sail, this time we're bringing along 2 couples who've never visited the BVI.

You might save some time by having 1 member of your group go straight to to silver check in counter and the rest bring up the bags.

If you are a member of a trusted traveler program , that would also help.

Excellent idea Warren, thank you!

If you can downsize to carry-on bags you'll have no problem. I do it all the time with less than an hour.

Checked bags will be very difficult. You have plenty of time to get thru security but Seaborne probably has a 1 hour cutoff so you only have 28 minutes to deplane, get to baggage, and back up to the counter. Check on the cutoff time with Seaborne. It's a hard cutoff on InterCaribbean because the gate agent physically goes up to the gate at the 1 hour mark.

+1 for carry on...no need for more

You do not have time to make it with checked bags. I would rebook to a later flight to avoid stress. As mentioned if you can do checked bags only you will be fine unless you are forced to gate check bags on a full flight. American is not operating any Silver flights however does connect with them and act as a booking agent.

Not sure why but why is it so challenging to fly to and from the BVI these days.... just received our 5th schedule change since we booked in March, now Silver Airways has pushed our departure time out of Tortola to San Juan back by 2 hours which only leaves us 55 minutes to get through immigration to catch our next flight home. Not gonna happen! No earlier flights that day so it looks like we may get stuck for an extra night in Tortola (not a bad thing) and fly out Sunday, assuming we can get United to change our flight home (which they should since they've changed our schedule 3 times...) I think I know why we stick to Puerto Vallarta more often then the BVI.

We have flown to SJU on various airlines over the years. We connect to EIS via Cape Air always. We have had to reschedule that connection more than once never any problem or fees to do that. We have also fine tuned the luggage to carry on only and that simplifies things alot.

Have a great trip.

We have been to the BVI's 20+ times, we have flown through SJU and through STT. We prefer STT and the ferry WAY over the SJU route.

I know others feel just the opposite, I guess it is a personal preference.

We fly out of Detroit, MI and always have a layover somewhere. We can still get to STT between noon - 3:30, we have always made the ferry over to Tortola the same day. Returning we take our time getting off the boat and take the ferry back to St. Thomas. We spend a night (or two) in St. Thomas before we fly home.

Hats off to United Airlines. We called them today and due to the 737 Max issues they rescheduled us to leave SJU later with no additional fees. American Airlines could learn a few things from them. Keep our fingers crossed NO more schedule changes. 6 is enough....

It’s pays to know each airlines rules of carriage. In general if they have changed your schedule a significant amount you are entitled to a free rebooking. Here is a good summary of the 3 major airlines.

https://thepointsguy.com/2017/03/when-an-airline-changes-itinerary/

That's probably why United was willing to help us out, adding an extra leg to our trip and moving the departure time back 3 hours created some havoc with our sailing group.

We are doing that exact thing in April Colleen...starting in Road Town vs Leverick makes that decision easy . Also looking forward to spending some time on St Thomas

Silver announced a 15% discount for travel this fall. IncludeS SJU-EIS Quick booking window.
https://www.silverairways.com/discover-silver/sales/travel-deals

I just booked a boat for April, we will be down from April 18-May 1st. When will you be down?